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My neighbour crossed the lawn in her house slippers to ask me to convey her gratitude to “The Star for being there, for sticking with the Ford story and informing us through the dark days of the last four years . . .”

Much appreciated, ma’am. There were times it felt very lonely.

“Now I can go away and forget about municipal politics,” the neighbour said, eliciting a scream:

“Noooooo. That’s one of the things that got us in trouble in the first place.”

Stay alert, people. Never leave your future to the politicians at city hall. Engage. Advocate. Educate your councillor and mayor, if you have to. Left to themselves, and their boot-licking advisers and sycophants, good people can do damaging things. And that goes for mayor-elect John Tory, a man whose temperament and history reeks of the sensibilities Toronto loves in a mayor.

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That is not to discount the lightness around town, the sense that the heaviness has dissipated.

The city hall security guard didn’t quite know what to do with himself last Tuesday when he attended Tory’s first post-election news conference on Nathan Phillips Square and had nothing to do, except stand and watch an orderly process of a politician speak, answer persistent questions, endure raindrops, complete the event, walk back to city hall with cameras clicking away, and then melt into the building as reporters scurried away to file video and words.

“Wow, that’s a change,” he said.

On the bus Monday, a man who identified himself as someone who corresponded by email some time ago, quipped: “No more drama, eh?”

Minutes later, at the lunch counter lineup at Café on the Square at city hall, a civil servant leaned over, almost apologetically, and said, “Boring times now, eh?”

Seconds later, another said: “Keep him honest.”

Of all the sentiments or exhortations, you can expect that last comment will guide this space.

The minute Tory starts getting full of himself — giving reporters the brush-off, refusing to release his daily itinerary, shutting out media outlets he doesn’t like, trying to control the flow of information — is the minute he starts building a base of frustrated journalists.

My read of the electorate is they want a mayor who looks after their money; will exercise extraordinary methods and tools to lead city council towards improving transit and relieving traffic congestion; lead GTA politicians in a unified attempt to gain regional goodies from the province and Ottawa; and represent Toronto and Canada well on the world stage.

And while he does that, they expect he will manage the many fires that will break out on the myriad of files and issues floating around the city.

When he fails, he will hear about it. If he screws up, you can count on reading about it. But you’ll also read effusive praise for early successes. It’s the nature of the relationship between media and new administrations.

The honeymoon starts now and will last till the first big gaffe or misstep. Then the clock will start ticking as we check trend lines.

During the election, Tory seemed confident he could improve rush-hour traffic. He promised to better coordinate traffic signals, crack down on illegal parking, and coordinate road construction. But success is not guaranteed, considering these are long-standing and oft-stated concerns. Everyone will be able to judge his success or failure.

On the city budget, increases around the rate of inflation are the norm. There will be little public outcry for anything approaching a 3 per cent tax hike. But anyone who’s been paying attention knows this cannot persist for years on end before the underfunded city’s infrastructure collapses.

Once Tory has earned fiscal credibility, he must turn towards a long-term reordering of city finances, with an eye on revenue sources outside of the property tax.

His signature campaign promise, SmartTrack, would provide relief to crowding on the Yonge subway line, and do so nearly twice as fast as current plans. That will require unprecedented coordination, drive, focus, skill and stamina. Such a high-profile enterprise begins immediately and will be catalogued ad nauseum.

But Tory’s most powerful attribute is the promise that he’ll be much more than someone who looks at the bottom line and nothing else; that he understands the social construct of a big city and the divisions that leave some citizens poor and vulnerable; that what he doesn’t know he will learn; that he will be a mayor of all the people.

I’m almost impatient to find out how quickly he lives up to that promise. One would have expected that his election platform would have included much more on this file — bridging the chasm between poor Toronto and comfortable Toronto.

His excuse is a credible one: An election is won on a simple, clear message. And the message for 2014 is transit and getting rid of the Ford era.

Well, mission accomplished. Now, we’ll see Tory’s true colours; and not flinch or shrink from describing them with brutal honesty.

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